With the advent of portable wireless digital radiography (DR) detectors, significant new opportunities are available for using x-ray imaging in various environments, including medical and dental applications and non-destructive testing (NDT) applications, such as inspection of pipe welds on oil/gas lines and aircraft structures, for example. Hospitals and other healthcare facilities in particular have expanded capability for obtaining x-ray images, including images obtained at the patient bedside. Unlike conventional radiographic image detectors, the wireless DR detectors can be positioned about the patient in a number of positions, without the concern for extending wires between the detector and image acquisition and power electronics. Portability with wireless operation also makes these devices suitable for use in veterinary imaging, since the DR detector can be flexibly positioned and there are no external wires that could be chewed or otherwise damaged during handling and positioning about the subject. It is also possible to use the DR detector in various outdoor environments, under a range of weather conditions for both medical and non-medical applications.
In conventional use as well as in veterinary, outdoor, and industrial and security imaging environments, the portable DR detector can be susceptible to damage in normal handling and use. The DR detector circuitry is formed on, and supported by, a glass panel substrate, or other suitably rigid substrate, that, altogether as an assembly, is encased in a protective housing. Even though the glass panel assembly is carefully packaged and supported within its housing, however, there remains some risk of damage. Some amount of rough handling is possible; the detector may be inadvertently dropped, stepped on, or subject to other shocks, mechanical stresses, point loading, and impact in any of the various environments in which it is operated.
Practical requirements for high portability, low weight, reduced dimensional profile, and versatile use run counter to the need to protect the relatively large glass substrate that supports sensitive circuitry inside the DR detector. Applying conventional approaches for buffering the internal glass panel from any possible type of impact could prevent the DR detector from being usable in one or more of its intended environments or applications. Thus, there is a need to achieve a reasonable balance between usability of the wireless DR panel and protection of its internal components.